KILLING TIME
by Mergatroid Skittles
Summary: Short drabbles centered around Linden and Holder as Season 2 goes along. HolderxLinden.
1. POSSIBILITIES

2x01 - Reflections

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><p>He holds the little man tightly, for maybe a second too long. Can't help it, he feels closer to this idiot kid than he does to just about anyone else. Except maybe his tough little mom. He wasn't really lying just now when he called Linden his BFF. She and the kid might be his only friends, actually, pathetic as that is.<p>

Lots of smoldering bridges in his rearview mirror, all these black carbon shells holding their shapes and waiting for a stiff breeze to blow them down to ashy piles. His sister wasn't even pissed he didn't make the kid's school thing the other day, when he was helping Sarah. "Typical," his sister said. Didn't even let him come inside when he finally showed up at their door after dropping off Sarah. Typical. Yeah.

That's why he holds this kid, his BFF's kid, this near-stranger's kid, so tight, cuz he wants another chance. Cuz he wants to make amends. Cuz he frickin' likes kids, okay? He likes being a role model and dumb shit like that. He likes the idea of being Jack's friend, his big brother, his uncle, maybe even...

Alright so in his most fevered, celibacy-induced nighttime mind wandering, he _maybe_ _just maybe_ imagined what it might be like to be more than a friend/big bro/uncle-figure to Jack Linden. Like, maybe even a dad. One day. Somehow. Talk about no blueprint, he never had a dad himself. But he's not a junkie thief punk anymore, he's a real cop now. He could be a dad, too, he knows he could.

Whatever. It was just a little daydreaming at night, nothing serious or for real. Just...thinking. Of Sarah Linden. And that tiny tight body of hers. And the way it feels to be in the pit with her, bracing shitbags like Belko Royce, their minds one, their cylinders clicking in time: that's a connection no online dating service could ever sell. And God help him, he's been _lonely_, alright? He's with the woman like nineteen hours a day, so his head goes places. To possibilities.

He likes Linden. Hell, more importantly, he _respects_ her. That photo of that politician fuck...the guy's guilty as sin, he _knows_ Linden is right. She's a terrible mom, maybe, but the best cop he knows and a super genius. But she was going half-mad putting it all together and he's sick to Christ of all the twisted circumstantial bullshit getting in their way.

And now...she's here, she's back. And he's not real sure why. Twenty-third missed flight? Bad blood with Mr. Sonoma? Cold feet? She is the ice queen and she ain't saying, pry as he might. He sits back down in his chair and says some nonsense about nasty stewardesses. But he'll eat his cigarette if she actually does go back to the airport _again_.

"Good luck cleaning up the mess," she says sharply. "I hope it was worth it."

His stomach drops down like a lead brick and pushes a choked laugh from him. He has no comeback, no words. That connection, that single-mindedness with her, his partner, his friend, it tells him this: _something's wrong_. Something big.


	2. THE GOSPEL OF JUDAS

2x02 - My Lucky Day

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><p>Head throbbing like a son of a bitch, splitting in two. Head-butting a door? <em>Shit<em>. Idiot. Idiot. Stupid stupid stupid fucking crankhead thief loser low-life tweaker not a cop, not a real cop, _nothing_, punk-ass patsy dupe lost little boy dirty cop.

Cheap piece of tin or aluminum or whatever the hell this is made out of – worth nothing and feels cheap in his hands. A shiny bauble. Shiny and distracting and made of nothing. Thirty pieces of silver or one shiny badge – same thing. Sell out your friend and your only ally, your savior, yourself, your soul, your future. Now what?

Wait. Maybe she'll open the door.

Wait. Maybe she'll let you back in.

Wait. Maybe she'll let you explain.

Wait and wait and wait. Head pounding.

She's not opening the door. Write a note, slip it under the door? _Bullshit_. No fucking idea what to write. He's all talk anyway.

Wait and she'll open the door and see him there and she'll take pity on him and she'll touch his hair and put her fingers in his hair and she'll softly tell him to come in and he'll try to explain and she'll forgive him and she'll push his coat off and let him hold her, let him be her Holder, and let him stay and let him sleep there, he'll sleep on the floor, he'll just sleep on the floor at the foot of her bed like a dog near its master, ready to bark and bite if anyone comes to hurt her, and in the morning...

Please let him come in. Please keep him safe right now because right now... He wants it. He _needs_ it. So bad. Worse than it's been in a _while_. Needs _something_. Feels it pulling. Needs it like the moon needs the earth.

The door stays shut. Quiet. She's been running from him all day. She _should_. He's dirty. He gets up without knowing where he's going or what he'll do when he gets there. He leaves the shiny bauble on the floor. If she ever does open the door, maybe it can do the explaining for him.


	3. CONSUMMATION DEVOUTLY TO BE WISHED

2x03 - Numb

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><p>"There," he hears her say behind him. Her slightest and lightest touch on the sleeve of his thick jacket gets his attention and he looks. Her car's up ahead. He slows, unsure what's expected, but she's going right for it so he follows. He's not real sure where he is, to be honest, where his car is. He was walking - he was running first but then he was walking and walking toward the lights.<p>

Lights coming towards him. He stared into them. Hypnotized. Wanting. Needing them. Lights at the end of the tunnel. Bright white light white go into the light walk into the light. Then you can be free. Free and at peace and oblivious and gone and no one will care and no one will miss you. No more of this. Stop. It's happening again. He's wasting away. He's tired. Everything's so _hard_. Everything's so _fucked up_. Every hour of every day this _struggle_, this hard scrabble fight, it never fucking _ends_. He's _losing_. He lost. He's lost. Everything he wanted to be, everything he fought so hard for – _what's the goddamn point now_ _he's never gonna win he's never gonna get better there's no POINT to any of it he's never gonna get it right he'll never be worth anything he'll never be GOOD! _

But then she was there.

He thought he was really losing it. She was a trick his spinning brains were playing on him to be cruel. A figment sent to taunt him and push him off that narrow median and into the light.

But she was really there. To save him.

And that was worse than a figment because he didn't _deserve_ to be rescued by her.

He remembers one last look into the lights, and how they swam. Tears in his eyes because she was there for him. He was gonna do it, he was gonna step into the light. He wanted it so goddamn bad – the way he wanted a hit, the way he wanted a lay. That's the shit of it, they're all the same – hit, lay, death. It's not the _thing_ he craves. It's not _pleasure_ he craves. It's the escape. The absence. But in that car with Claire on top of him, there was no escape, no absence, try as he might. It hurt worse than ever.

And now he's in Linden's car. It smells like her wool sweater and it's warm, the heater on. She even turned on the heated seat for him. He can't bear to look at her, the shame of it all, the tears still in his eyes – Jesus Christ, the shame is sitting on him like a column of seawater. It fucking burns as it crushes him.

"Where is it? Rosie's backpack," she demands flatly, hard.

He struggles to swim up, focus. She needs him – needs him to answer her questions, needs him to be useful, needs him to be honest, needs him here. "My car, the trunk," he chokes out.

"Where's your car?"

Good question. He sits up a little, looks out the window, makes himself _see_. She needs him to not be a fuck-up for five seconds. "Down there. The lot under the freeway."

She jams the car into drive and they're moving, driving in silence. He has about five hundred twenty-three things he needs to - would _like_ to - say to her. But he can't right now because the shame still has a grip on his throat. He's taking her to the backpack and that's as much grace as he can expect right now.


	4. NORMAL OPERATING PROCEDURE

2x04 - Ogi Jun

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><p>He's spent all day trying to get on her good side, make her smile, wriggle his way back into her good graces cuz she said she <em>didn't care<em> when he finally got a chance to ham-fistedly explain himself, cuz she's _majorly pissed_ at him. He kinda really hates when she's that pissed. Maybe it's some sorta pathological need to butter up the responsible female figure in his life. He's been playing that game with his sister for a long time.

Linden is _not_ his sister. Not not not.

He gets it, though. Shitstorm. Shithead loser partner. Shitty authority figures they can't fucking trust. Shit with Little Man Jack. Shit with Mr. Sonoma. Etc etc etc. Can't stop a guy from trying for a smile though.

That FBI mofo's giant monster glasses were hilarious, in his opinion. Putting those goggles on – oooo boy, the look she gave him? Strip the paint right off the walls with that look. Hell, he even bought her breakfast and prepped her coffee for her just the way she likes it – black black black.

But nary a grin to be found for him.

"...Sins of the father and all that," he rambles, ever the great profiler.

"Did you read that in O Magazine?" she answers back.

Whoops, wait a second, hold the fucking phone, what's this? A _joke_ again! That's like...that's _almost_ like a smile, in a way, isn't it? making jokes? That's a _glimmer_, right? The window opening a crack?

He doesn't try to force it open further, though – he lets it ride for the moment.

Linden tells him her theory - their quarry is a "planner." Maybe. She would know, right? That's her world, right? He absorbs that while they sit watching Comic Con's apartment house in silence for a few minutes. His mind wanders, spins, circles back on itself, circuitous, second-guessing. Something seems off, seems like they're barking up the wrong tree, trying to find Tattoo Boy. Maybe his theory's wrong – maybe Rosie didn't like bad boys. How would Mr. I'm-Gonna-Regret-That-Ink-When-I'm-Fifty even _get_ access to a Richmond campaign car, anyway?

Shit. When he starts thinking too much for himself, trying to figure out shit for himself, that's when he gets into trouble, isn't it?

He has another theory – _Linden_ likes bad boys. She just doesn't want to/won't ever/would rather die than admit to it. But pretending that part of her doesn't exist won't make it go away. It'll always be there. She just needs to figure out how to accept it. She's a bad girl pretending to be a good girl. She needs a bad boy to match her, is all.

He pries on the window a little: "So 'sup with you and that Fed? You and that Tom Waits Wannabe ever hook up or what?" Risking life and limb now, tenuous. But fuck, the look on her face – man, he _knows_ her! Does he know her or does he know her? "Oh snap, Linden rocked the booty call!"

A grin, a palpable grin now. The glimmer becoming a gleam. "Dial one-nine hundred Linden!"

And he's got her. A smile. Oh but she's fighting it. "That's not even enough numbers." She can run but she can't hide that smile from him, no sir.

And it's like the air is suddenly washed clean between them. The ice broken, like a loud fart in bed after a first lay. It's a relief, being back in her good favor, slipping back inside her fold.

Until he fucks it up thirty short seconds later with one errant pondering word: "Sonoma." Bad move, bad move, bad move. The window slams shuts on his fingers and her face is carved in ice and he's out in the cold again, suddenly booted from the car before he knows what's happening.

No, he _knows_ what's happening. He fucked up _again_. His stupid mouth.

Doesn't mean he was _wrong_, though.

Cuz it _does_ make perfect sense, why she left Mr. Sonoma holding the bag o' wine: Mr. Sonoma ain't no bad boy. Hell, FBI Man ain't one either. They're good boys. She tries to pin herself to a good boy, so maybe their normalcy, their goodness, their _ordinariness_ will rub off on her, turn her into Betty Crocker, the soccer mom fantasy she grew up without.

And yet - she's not with either of them, is she? Poor Mr. Sonoma didn't have a chance and FBI Man was just a hook-up. Even that massive d-bag who calls himself Jack's father looked like a good boy, too, very normal, very ordinary. And what happened with that guy, huh?

No, she wants a _bad boy_ and here he is, the baddest of boys, rooting around inside her head and under her skin, getting too close to the bony truth, and she could not deal. So she kicks him out the car and makes tracks. Pushes him away again.

Yeah, things are definitely _normal_ again. Sure.


	5. THE ONLY IMPEDIMENTS

2x05 - Ghosts of the Past

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><p>It's almost four a.m. by the time Linden pulls up to the curb in front of his apartment building. These clothes stink like hell – he's lost track when he last slept, last changed. Bed and a shower call, not in that order. Linden throws the car into park but leaves the engine running, looking at him expectantly.<p>

"You wanna come up, Linden?" he asks luridly, wolf grin stretching, teasing her.

She says nothing, not taking his bait – _again_ – the same way she ignored his crack earlier about people thinking she dumped Mr. Sonoma for his cracker ass. At least she looks somewhat amused and doesn't call him a dick. She's gotta get that Tylenol home to her kid, anyway - as if that's the only impediment to them going up to his dumpy studio and getting sweaty together on his mattress on the floor.

He's climbing out of the car when her words stop him. "Good work tonight, Holder."

A compliment. Banner fucking day. "You too," he replies seriously, choosing to take the moment seriously. He nearly adds _Sarah_ to the end of that sentence.

"I'll pick you up at eight," she says.

His body aches at the thought of such a short rest. What he says, though, is, "I'm like twenty minutes outta your way. I'll just meet you at the station." A generous, chivalrous offer on one hand (in his opinion), but on the other hand a bit more self-serving – he can show up like twenty, thirty, forty minutes late if she ain't rolling up on him at eight a.m. sharp.

"No, I'll come get you."

He looks at her, arguments on his tongue. Why is she insisting anyway? But there's something written on her face – still the mistrust? still all the reasons why she wouldn't let him deal with Alexi's deadbeat mom on his own? "You don't need to babysit me, Linden."

The way she doesn't blink, doesn't shift a muscle, tells him it's something else. Something making her eyes shiny and big and sad. _Concern_. Shit, that's what it is. It scares him how good he's getting at reading her. "I'm good, I swear," he promises. Shame pricks and burns like needles under his skin but he says anyway, "I'm not gonna wander into traffic again."

"I know," she says immediately. Does she? She jams the car into drive. "Be ready at eight."

"No promises," he answers, smirking.

He drags himself upstairs to his shithole flat and takes the world's hottest, shortest shower before flopping face-first and naked onto the mattress. His bedclothes are stinkier than his manclothes. She woulda balked at screwing on dirty, ass-smelling sheets anyway - as if that would be the only other impediment.

With his very last ounce of strength, he sets the alarm on his phone – seven forty-five. Just enough time to take a piss, scarf a chocolate Pop Tart, and pull on some clean clothes before Linden fetches him. He'll be ready.


	6. DOMESTIC

2x06 - Openings

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><p>He offers to make them some sushi, too, and Linden tries to poo-poo the notion, being overly polite - "We don't want to be any bother" and all that nonsense, etc etc. He insists and makes them each a roll. Avocado and cucumber – that's all he's got, but it's good. They eat in silence until he just can't take it anymore. "So what's up, what's going on?"<p>

"Nothing. Someone broke into our motel room."

"Yeah, mom freaked out," Jack adds. "I was like, whatever, we'll get a new room."

"It's not safe there," she insists sharply, cramming sushi into her mouth. She's terse and edgy and he knows she's holding out on him, as usual. He waits, watches her chew. She's _scared_, is what. She avoids his gaze and ain't gonna say any more about it, that's plain. "Tell him about your quiz, Jack." Changing the subject. But Jack fills the silence, tells him about a quiz he aced today.

It ends up the three of them on the old pull-out couch he dragged in from the curb last year, talking about what all's happening with Jack's school, the lame ass teachers he's got, the history project he's got coming up. He corrupts Jack's tender young mind with old stories about his own time raising hell in school – Linden lets him. She even laughs out loud, briefly, when he wraps up with, "And I turned out okay, didn't I?"

Linden's changing in the bathroom when Jack mentions how he might want to try out for the wrestling team at school. "Show me what you got, son," he says immediately, and they're grappling, nearly knocking over his lamp in the small living room. Linden doesn't even try to break it up – she just stands at the doorway watching, a little smile on her face – and this? This? _All of this?_ This is exactly sorta kinda pretty much exactly what he imagined it'd be like to be more than a friend/big bro/uncle-type to Jack Linden. Being his _dad_.

For one night, at least.

Or, more accurately, at least until it's time to pull out the pull-out and make it up for her and Jack. If he really _were_ Jack Linden's father, Sarah Linden wouldn't be sharing no bed with her kid, that's for damn sure. Hell, she doesn't have to be sharing a bed with her kid _tonight_ either...but if he even hinted at such a possibility, she'd probably have them packed up again and outta here in a hot second.

The Lindens are tucked up into bed, lights out, and he jumps into the shower. Not a short one tonight, a nice long one cuz he's thinking. The case – that's a mental roadblock, frankly. Better - thinking about how unexpectedly happy he was when they showed up tonight, how unexpectedly happy he was to welcome them into his home and have them here with him. Thinking about the flipside – _why_ they're here. And that worries him because something's _wrong_. Something scared Sarah pretty damn bad. Little Miss Self-Reliance running to _him_ when something scares her? That worries him even more.

He'd normally just go straight from the shower to bed, naked, but he can't with them here. He's pulling on his sweatpants when he hears something. Someone breaking in here, too? No – no it's someone opening the cupboards in the kitchen. He cinches his drawstring and leaves the bathroom, not bothering with a shirt, padding down the hall in his bare feet.

Sarah. She's on her tiptoes, looking through his cupboards in the near-total dark. "Whatcha need, Linden?" he asks very quietly, mindful of Jack in the other room.

"Glass," she says just as quietly. "I need some water."

"Here," he says, opening the fridge, pulling out a bottled water for her. "Tap water's nasty."

She takes the bottle from him and he leans on the fridge, leaving it open, bathing them in dim yellow. Bright enough to easily see her eyes on his bare chest, her poker face in place but her gaze betraying her. Oh snap – she likes what she sees.

"You don't drink tap water, do you?"

She cracks open the bottle, takes a sip. "This could've come from a tap," she points out.

"Nah, it's from some mountain spring, right?"

"So they say. Can't trust what people say, though." She takes another sip. Her eyes on his face now. "Hard to know who to trust."

"True that." He pushes away the idea that she means _him_. She's here, ain't she? She and her kid came to _him_. "Too true," he reiterates, nodding slowly, wheels spinning. "Linden. What the _fuck_ was Gil Sloane doing in Carlson's office today?" he asks with urgency, voice dipping, covering his swear.

"I don't know."

"It's bad, Linden, it's real bad."

"I know."

"What're we gonna do about it?"

"I don't know," she says, barely a whisper. "We can't talk about this now—"

"Yeah, yeah, right," he agrees. "Come on, we can talk in my room."

She gives him this wry-ass look and says, "No, Holder."

If he ever blushed, he would now because he _swears_ he didn't just try to get her into his bedroom. He seriously didn't mean it like that. He just meant _talking_. About the shitstorm they're in and whatnot. "I wasn't-"

"It's time for bed," she interrupts.

Now he _has_ to tease her, doesn't he. "Isn't that what I was just saying?" Hey, she opened the door, he walked through, that's what they do.

She screws the cap onto her water and edges past him. "We'll be out of your hair first thing in the morning," she promises.

He shrugs, shuffles his bare feet. "You can stay as long as you want." He lets the refrigerator door swing shut and it's real dark when he reaches out and puts his arms around her shoulders, hugging her loosely, lightly. "You're safe here," he says quietly. He should let her go now. But then he feels her hand on his waist, her skin on his, hers cool from the water she was holding. It sends a shiver zipping up his spine. Hugging him back – just about – just for a moment, before she slips past him and leaves the kitchen.

He stays awake for a long time after that, listening to the night. Listening for anyone who would dare come in here to hurt his family.


	7. A TRAIN COMING

2x07 - Keylela

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><p>Goddamn you, Holder. If he were here right now, she'd tell him how much she hates him.<p>

She never should've gone running to him last night. She should've just found another motel. She should've stayed with a friend – if she had any. She _used_ to have friends in this town. Now all she has is Holder? How fucked up is her life?

She hates herself for trusting him again, letting him in, even a little. Shame on her for thinking she could share her thoughts with him - about Rosie the Butterfly, about _anything_. He called her thoughts "mumbo jumbo", mocked her with that ghost whisperer shit, said she was cracking up. Asshole.

She didn't tell anyone about his escapade on that overpass, wandering through traffic. She didn't report him, she didn't tell Lt. Carlson that her partner was the one cracking up – the partner who royally fucked up this case himself, by the way. She only threw that stuff back in Holder's face because he had it coming. Prick. Who is he to call her out on _anything_?

Holder's a dick – she keeps forgetting that. No goddamn breakfast burrito and coffee can change the fact he's a dick. And she swore off jerks like him a long, long time ago.

She could feel it last night, as she was trying to fall asleep – the pull. She could feel herself starting to wonder what it'd be like to be with Holder. Just a brief, fleeting tickle in the back of her head because she really was feeling safe there. And maybe that was the best reason of all to find a new place to stay. She doesn't need to fuck up her life even further by sleeping with her partner just because she's scared and he's convenient.

She looks over at Jack, leaning against the door. His breathing - steady and soft. He's cried himself to sleep – because she's a shitty mom. Because her life is fucked up. Because her life is being ruined by this case, by someone working real damn hard to ruin _her_, bring her down any way they can. She was supposed to be retired and married by now. Instead she's homeless and on the run. She's supposed to be with Rick right now. Instead...

Instead she needs Holder. And she _hates_ that.

She pulls the car to a stop at the train crossing. She speed dials him. Voicemail again. Where the fuck is he? Her voice quiet, trying not to wake Jack. "Hey, Holder. I don't know where you are but you need to call me. There's something going on, I don't know what, but just... Just call me." The softness, the desperation in her voice – she hears it, hates that too.


	8. SO LONG, JIMMY SOMETHING

2x08 - Off the Reservation

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><p>His sister told her to fuck off, leave Stephen alone, and gave her the one thing guaranteeing she would: a lead. That matchbook. She could've, would've, should've sat in that hallway all day, keeping a guilt-ridden vigil, thinking about how she almost got her partner killed, how <em>dead dead dead he's dead<em> he looked under that tree, fighting back the urge to vomit. Instead, a lead. She didn't have to _stop_ and fight down her vomit any longer. She grabbed that lead and then it was just _go_.

Some of the boys in her seventh grade class, and boys in the grade ahead, a bunch of them wore big gold chains and baggy tracksuits with one leg pulled up to the knee, listened to rap music and wore their hats backwards, tried to talk like Pootie Tang and Ice T and the Beastie Boys, their heroes. They used to call those kids "whiggers". Whigger. What a terrible word, she can't believe they said that, but back then - they were just kids, they didn't know any better, they didn't realize it was terrible. And the boys _liked_ being called that word, that was the thing – a badge of honor. She even "went out" with one of them – Jimmy something. He had big white sneakers that were never tied and always threatened to come right off his feet. Flirting – i.e. punching each other in the arm and screaming curse words at each other on the playground – led to kissing after school led to whatever passed for dating in seventh grade. Not much, as she recalls. Then she was on to another foster home. So long, Jimmy What's-His-Name, thanks for the grope.

Holder reminds her of those boys in middle school, the "whiggers". Exactly like them, all grown up.

Maybe that's why all his whiggity-whack talk doesn't annoy her - because it's familiar, it's old school, it's...nostalgic.

He's quite just now, riding shotgun again as they speed down the freeway back to Seattle, heading back in from SeaTac. No whiggity-whack talk, but she can hear the slight wheeze every time he breathes beneath his busted ribs.

The more she gets to know him, the more she understands all the come-ons and put-ons he uses. The way he adapts things for his own personal purposes - black culture, his vegetarian cheeseburgers and his reasoning behind Pork Rinds, his Zen Buddhist Jesus philosophy, taking on whatever he responds to and wearing it like a mantle, like a big fucking hoodie – he uses those things to confuse people, keep them off balance and unsure what to make of him. Some of it's because he was an undercover. But adapting and adopting are his ways of _surviving_, she's realized. Surviving being an ex-junkie. Surviving growing up in a poor area, a black neighborhood – adopting the talk, even breakdancing, as his sister revealed, being a "whigger" to _survive_, to fit in, so he wouldn't be the White Kid Walking, a target.

The more she gets to know him, the more she sees underneath all those come-ons and put-ons. Glimpses now and then, things she didn't even register at the time. The Holder she had to coax from the middle of the freeway. The Holder who peeled himself out of his hospital bed to come to her side at the airport tonight. The Holder who let her and Jack into his dojo, his home, his personal sanctuary, sheltering and protecting and caring for them. When she saw him without his hoodie yesterday morning, for the first time without all the cotton bulk, his mantle gone, she saw the Real Stephen Holder, the man who wears an apron and cooks organic breakfast and hands her a hot coffee and wears his heart on his sleeve - _literally_, his nephew's name carved into his forearm. He showed her his heart and she almost sent him to his death.

But Holder's _not_ dead, she _didn't_ kill him – he's a survivor, always has been, he learned how long ago. And Jack's gone. Her heart is broken. And there's another lead. Time to _go. Go._

She just can't _stop_.

"Rosie's key." He doesn't say anything. She can't stop. "It'll get us into the construction site, tenth floor. It's where she was abducted. We need to get that key," she adds.

_Go go go go go go go go go go go go go go go._

The blinking lights of an ascending plane catch her eye.

Everyone leaves her eventually. She wears them out, pushes them away, she's too intense, she's too distant, she has no balance, she demands too much, she's uncompromising. Because she just can't _stop_. She wonders how much longer Holder will put up with it before he leaves her, too.


	9. CALL ME DR JUNG

2x09 - Sayonara Hiawatha

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><p>Rain on the dark glass, bending light from signs. Red orange yellow blue green glowing running bright in the dark.<p>

"Holder."

He looks away from the window and she's already moving, leaning toward him, and he knows what's coming.

She smiles just a little, he smiles just a little when she kisses him but he's nervous but happy. The inside of her mouth is warm wet slippery _good_ yes he likes this. She climbs on top of him and his balls ache muscles tighten. He's so cramped, his seat pushed too far up no room can't move his arms and legs the way he wants she's trapped him in his seat. His clothes are off hers off too so suddenly they're naked in her car he's inside her already oh _god yes_ so deep inside her. He _likes_ this yes but wants to slow down wants her to touch him wants her hands on his body and his on her but they race ahead her breasts bouncing in his face he wants to touch them he can't move his arms they're trapped. Her face turned away eyes squeezed shut her body bouncing it's _so good_ but bad frustrating he jerks strains tries to fuck her harder get her attention get her eyes on him.

"Hey," he says. She doesn't look at him maybe she can't hear him is he speaking? "Hey," he says louder insistent. She keeps her head turned she wants to be somewhere else he wants her with him his dick throbbing eyes watering it's so damn sexy hot so _good_ so awful so maddening painful he wants her all of her more more more of her look at me Linden _please_ be here Linden _please baby_ I need you let me in_._

"You got any?" she says flat.

* * *

><p>It comes back to him again hours and hours and hours later, for no reason. They're just scarfing victory sushi after raiding Gil Sloane's storage unit and stashing the Larsen files in the back of his car, and suddenly boom – he's flashing on last night's sex dream. She's chewing away on raw tuna and he's getting the <em>slightest<em> bit hard.

But it wasn't just some sex dream, was it? Sometimes a cigar is a cigar and a penis is a penis and a sex dream is just cuz you're lonely and horny but this ain't that. And it wasn't simply a fucked up replay of that unpleasant business with Claire last week, was it? Nah, not really. Nah, it's because Linden is a goddamn succubus and he's a goddamn fool, that's what it is.

He offers her a warm, safe place to crash last night after she shipped her son across the country - and she sleeps all night in her car in a parking lot. He makes that clumsy offer just now in the storage unit, to listen, to be there for her - and she says "I know" and will never take him up on it. He asks if she's okay - and she says "fine" every time, even when she is clearly _not_ fine. It's maddening.

And this is how she sucks men in.

Making them feel they need to protect her, help her, comfort her because she's troubled and tiny. Making them want to understand her, wanting her to let them in because she so steadfastly refuses, because she's so stubborn and quiet. Making them need to "fix it," fix what's wrong because men need to fix shit. Making them want be a hero. Making them want her because she's unattainable. She knows just how to push all these buttons in men.

He's getting sucked in. Deeper and deeper. He's aware. And he's aware he's a fool because he knows it can't end well - he already has the bruises to prove it.


	10. A LINE TOO FAR

2x09 - Sayonara Hiawatha

* * *

><p>The silence is heavy duty, waiting and waiting out here for the maid to open the damn door or answer her damn phone. Every other second he's checking his mirrors to see if a war party is coming up behind them sneak attack-style to haul them outta the car and into the woods. He and Linden go into those woods again? They ain't coming back again. And the cavalry ain't coming. Nobody else knows they're here. 'Cept for Mary the Wayward Maid and <em>clearly<em> they can't count on her.

Silence is a void he can't abide. It leaves his mind too much time to eat itself.

"Lookit, Linden, when I say I'm here, I'll listen, that you can talk to me, I'm not, like, I'm not—"

"Holder," she warns.

"It's not because you're a chick, y'know?" he persists, even though he can _hear_ her eyes rolling. "I get it. I do. Being a girl in the boy's club—"

"You know what that's like, huh?"

"I know enough to know I _don't_ know what it's like. How hard it is. How much shit you gotta put up with." He hesitates, wondering if she'll smack an injured man for what he's about to say. Saying it anyway. Fast. "This morning at the station I was taking a pee after I talked to Carlson, right, and some uni is in there and he says to me, he actually says to _me_-" Mumbling around a thick, half-witted tongue, imitating stupid as best he can, "'Hey Holder, how hard you tapping your partner's hot little ass, man?'" He hears her head snap around, feels her eyes digging into him, the burn in them. "And I swear to god, Linden, I almost put his head through the tiles. I wanted to kill him."

"Jesus Christ, Holder—"

"I didn't touch him. I wanted to. I just said to him, 'Only as hard as you suck your partner's hairy, sweaty balls. And it's _Detective_ Holder to you, asshole.'" He chances a glance her way and catches her actually smiling at that, and that makes him smile, too, relieved. "Ain't no one allowed to make innuendo about you 'cept _me_, Linden."

She thinks that's funny, he can tell, but her smile grows hard, a grimace. "But they do."

"I know. And that's when I got it. You gotta be 'okay', you gotta be 'fine', you gotta be _schtum_. No matter what. All day every day. You can't give them an inch or they'll take a mile. But I ain't those guys, Linden. When I say you can talk to me, when I ask if you're okay, it's not 'cuz I think you're weak 'cuz you don't got a dick between your legs. It's 'cuz I care. It's 'cuz I'm yours."

Her eyes get big, glittering in the low light, and she snaps her head around again, hiding her face from him.

He thinks he probably just crossed the line there. Tries to cover. "I'm your partner. I'm your shrink, your priest. Partner-partner confidentiality clause, Linden. Okay?" She's quiet over there. Maybe this was a waste of breath, maybe he just stripped himself bare for nothing, maybe she won't ever take him up on this. But he had to say it. He had to try again.

She finally speaks. "I got the goods on you, too, Holder."

"I know you do."

"So are _you_ okay?"

Turning the question back around on him. "I'm scared. Parts of me hurt a lot. I don't wanna be here. But I'm with you, Linden. No matter what."

She nods, quick and hard, but doesn't look at him. He flexes his right hand, wishing he could touch her, pull her to him, bury his nose in her auburn curls, give strength and take it. They need each other.

Instead he sits still and the void comes again and they sit and wait in silence.


	11. PROMISES PROMISES

2x10 - 72 Hours

* * *

><p>He sits. He stands. He paces. He sits again. He stands, he paces paces paces, he waits. Waiting room, where you wait. He's so fucking sick of waiting. Waiting all last night until the dawn - couldn't sleep, just drove around, drank a lot of coffee, plotted out his next moves. Waiting all day today to finally see her.<p>

God, she was so fucked up. It scared the shit outta him.

He made a promise. He promised not to leave her there and holy everlasting fuck that's a promise he's gonna keep or die trying. He'd get her out, but to do that...if he'd known...

He didn't know Mr. Sonoma was _Doctor_ Sonoma. He didn't know Mr. Sonoma – sorry, Dr. Sonoma – was her fucking psychiatrist. He felt sick as he dialed Dr. Sonoma's phone number, his guts twisting, an aching hollow feeling deep inside. Hard to say why – no, _lots_ of reasons why: Maybe Sonoma wouldn't help and Sarah would be stuck in there forever and his promise be broken and the case buried and Sarah left to rot in a drugged-up stupor. Wondering what might happen if Sarah saw her ex again. Wondering if Sonoma really was an ex.

Wondering, _been_ wondering for awhile now, if Sarah would go back to that guy once the case was through - finally fly down to California, work things out with him, get married, live happily ever after in a vineyard with the sun on her face and the breeze in her hair.

Still wondering tonight as he paces here in this waiting room if Rick will take Sarah away from him.

Not long ago (but oh so long ago), he thought she _was_ gone, gone to get married, the case over. And that was fine, that's the way it was supposed to be since the day they met. But now...now that sorta fills him with dread and sadness and the deep achy hollow feeling. He doesn't want her to go. How quickly things change. But when someone saves your life a few times, you tend to form an attachment.

This time, he needs to save her. Even if that means losing her to the man walking through the door right now. The man who gets to kiss her and hold her. The man she trusts and fucks. A doctor. Rich and responsible and _good_. The man she loves.

"I'll help get her out," Dr. Sonoma tells him. "But I can't be involved any more. She's your responsibility now."

The words hit him like a ton of bricks. He can't imagine what Sarah would say to that, being fobbed off like a stray pet or an old car. But these are words not meant for her ears, these are words spoken man to man, and the other man is eyeballing him, sizing him up.

No, okay, he ain't a doctor, he ain't a psychiatrist, he ain't _good_, but he's up to the responsibility. He is. He promises.

But god it _hurts_ when he sees her on the stairs - the look on her face when she sees Dr. Sonoma, the look of hope and love. It fucking burns so bad. He has to look away. He knew it'd be like this. She chooses him - _Sonoma_. She'll always choose him. Just a reminder she was gonna _marry _that guy. The jealousy new and almost too much to stomach.

And it hurts even more when she walks into the waiting room searching for Rick, the hopefulness and happiness written on her skin dissolving to sadness and disappointment when she realizes Rick's gone. Just sad resignation when she realizes it's just him, just that pathetic lonely shitty old tweaker Stephen Holder waiting for her, here for her.

But she gives him a smile anyway and he smiles back, bravely. He kept his promise. Mission accomplished. They live to fight another day. Time to get the hell outta this boobyhatch.

"Thank you, Holder," she says once they're in the car.

He shrugs a little – cuz really it was the man she loves who got her outta there. "No problem," he mumbles. She hasn't even done up her seatbelt, he notices. He reaches across and pulls it over her body, fastens it. She leans back against the seat and closes her eyes, her face so pale and drawn with exhaustion. She's asleep before he reaches the first stoplight.

That Regi lady said something today about how the last time Sarah ended up in the nuthouse, she'd not been eating, not been sleeping, neglecting herself and everything else but The Case. And he'd disagreed – "This time is different." Different - this time Sarah was being set up, framed, discredited and locked up by powerful people so The Case would go away.

What he really meant, what he couldn't say? This time is different because Sarah has him. Watching her back, watching out for her. He'll make sure she sleeps and eats and gets her son back. He'll make sure she never ends up in a place like that again. He promises.


	12. A MOVEABLE FEAST

2x10 - 72 Hours

* * *

><p>"Are we home yet?"<p>

He starts a little in his seat – thought she was sleeping. She looks asleep, still slumped against the passenger door, eyes closed. "Almost, girl," he assures her. "I just wanna stop at Dick's real quick."

"Who's Dick?"

"Dick's Drive-In," he clarifies. "It'll only take a sec. Then home." It sounds strange cuz it sounds normal, like they "go home" together every night.

She makes a little sound. "I used to go to Dick's all the time. Took the monorail to Key Arena. Walked over."

"Yeah? You like some Dick...'s?" he teases, grinning. Nearly apologizes for the shitty joke, feeling like an ass, when he gets no reaction. Then she raises her hand, flips him the bird. He chuckles, knowing it's okay.

He drives a block or two, wondering if he should say what's on his mind before she falls asleep again. He doesn't usually filter himself so much. When did that start? Maybe when shit started getting _real_, is when.

"So check it, Linden. After this is all over, after we close this thing – and we _will_, we're so close, I promise you - after it's done and after we get Jack back, right? Yo, I'm gonna take you someplace _nice_ for dinner, y'know what I'm sayin'? None of this drive-thru fast-food grab-n-go shit. Somethin' real nice. You and me. Like... Oh, snap, I know - that churrasco place in Bellevue. I been dying to go there. You know about churrasco? That's where they come around with all this roasted meat on big spits, bring it right to your table, carve it off onto your plate. Sirloin and lamb and chicken and ribs and pork and sausage. A roaming meat buffet, what could be better than that?"

He finally zips it and licks his lips, nervous but also thinking about meat, waits for her to say something. Anything. Like, for example, "No, Holder, we won't go to dinner together because that's a stupid idea and I'm still going to California when this is over and I don't care if I rip out your heart and stomp all over it." Or some variation of that.

She's still got her eyes closed. He's still waiting. Finally - "You asking me out, Holder?"

His foot jerks on the brake pedal, spastic, and he casts about in his empty brain for what to say. Finally manages to mumble, "Jack can come, too."

"Holder," she says sternly. Eeeek, here it comes! "You'd go into a _coma_ if you ate that much meat."

Oh. "Nah, I wouldn't," he disagrees, feeling absurdly pleased that she didn't shoot him right down with an elephant gun. "But I'd definitely need a nap after."

She smiles and yawns and shifts, settling back into her own nap. He can't remove the grin from his face.

Two more blocks and they hit their destination. He pulls into the near-empty lot, parks, and turns to her, watching her a moment before asking, "So whatcha want, Linden? And just so you know, 'nothing' and 'just coffee' are not acceptable answers." He'll argue with her, if need be, fight with her, if she wants.

"Just get me something greasy and meaty and covered in cheese, please," she mutters sleepily. "And fries. And a strawberry shake."

Sounds good to him. Make that two to go. He pops his door, climbing out as he tells her, "Anything you want, mamacita."


	13. NEVER STOP

2x10 72 Hours

* * *

><p>She hardly knew what she was saying, <em>if<em> she was saying anything, if words were actually coming out of her mouth or if she were just thinking them: "Please don't leave me here." _Please don't leave me here please don't leave me here._ But she heard him loud and clear, intense and urgent, answering what she was saying even if she hadn't really said it. "I'm gonna get you out of here. Y'hear? I'm not leaving you here."

The lady, Dr. _Kerry_, was talking about keeping her in there for a _week_. Bitch. Dr. Kerry. Was that supposed to be her first name or her last name? As if calling her by her first name with "Doctor" tacked on made everything fuzzy wuzzy happy slappy okie dokey. A fucking week. That's how it started last time. Seventy-two hours turned into a week turned into two weeks turned into a month. They couldn't do this. _She_ couldn't do it, she couldn't do another turn in that place, _no fucking way_. She'd fight and fight and fight them, fight until they drugged her up so much she didn't know _where _she was, _who_ she was, _nothing_. That was one way out. The other way out...well...

In her stupor she thought she heard him say, "Just hang tight for a couple hours." But by the time they rolled in a tray of bad hospital food, it had been more than a couple hours. And she stared at that tray long and hard, resistant, unwilling to give in on any level. He said he wouldn't leave her there. She badly wanted to believe him. She wouldn't eat because he was coming for her.

The food on the tray was getting cold and a dark voice was whispering in her ear. Maybe she couldn't believe him; maybe he'd _never really been there at all_, a figment of the drugs; maybe, at the end of the day, despite his best intentions, he was just like everyone else: a letdown, untrustworthy, a disappointment.

The food on the tray was stone cold and she knew: Holder wasn't coming for her, Holder couldn't get her out, she had to get herself out.

So she ate. And she talked. The food was gummy and gluey and bad but her stomach betrayed her and screamed for more. The talk was hard, painful, every word drawn out of her at gunpoint, every answer a violation, her every instinct betrayed, her darkest and most private corners being scraped out with a wire coat hanger.

And then a door opened. And the words "officially released" didn't come to her in a stupor. And she _knew_: Holder. He'd come through. He was for real. He wasn't like everyone else. The door was open and she walked through it. It felt like a door opening inside of her, too, creaking open slowly, something bright and warm behind it.

She went back to the room, her _cell_, and pulled that puke-yellow gown off, tossed it away. Pulled her own clothes on fast, hurrying because Holder was downstairs waiting for her. Pulled on her shoes and wondered if he'd hug her when he saw her. Pulled on her coat and decided _she'd_ hug _him_ first, throw herself at him and throw her arms around his skinny waist. Mindful of his ribs, though. She pushed through the ward door as soon as the lock clicked. She hurried downstairs.

Now she's sitting in his car, watching as he stands by the counter at Dick's, impatient under the white fluorescents, never standing still for a second as he waits for their order to come up. He never stands still. He never stops. She's learning that.

Here he comes, a bag of food in one hand, two huge to-go cups in the other, grinning away. What a mother hen he is. Thinks he's so clever, trying to put thoughts of food in her head with his talk of roasted meat and Brazilian barbecue, trying to make her hungry so she'd want to eat. He's not clever, she saw right through that ploy. And she was hungry anyway.

Rick being in that waiting room, it threw her, surprised her, confused her, made her think for a moment he might... Well, it made her forget all about Holder. Until she saw him standing there shuffling his feet, waiting meekly for her to notice him. She didn't hug him. She clammed up. She feels shitty for that. Some BFF she is. She's sorry she didn't have more faith in Holder. She's sorry she didn't hug him. She should've.


	14. NOW VOYAGER

2x11 – Bulldog

* * *

><p>"Cupcake?"<p>

She glances away from the water as he comes up to stand at the railing beside her. He holds a Hostess cupcake wrapped in cellophane. "No," she tells him.

He stuffs the cupcake in his pocket and pulls a Twinkie from it. "Twinkie?"

"No."

He stuffs that away, too, and pulls a candy bar from his other pocket. "Snickers?"

"No."

He shoves that away and pulls out a Reese's. Jesus Christ, he got a whole candy store in that jacket? "Peanut butter cup? These were for me," he admits. "But I'll split it with you."

This is their _last shot_ at the tenth floor of the casino and it might not even happen and she doesn't want fucking candy! "I don't know what's more annoying, Holder," she says sharply. "You trying to feed me all the time or you feeding me _sugar_ all the time."

His reply is dipped in saccharine sarcasm. "Yeah, you don't need more sugar, honey, cuz you're already just as sweet as can be."

He stuffs the Reese's away and leans down against the railing on his forearms, staring straight down into the water as it rushes under the ferryboat. What, he's pouting now, like she _took away_ his candy? Ugh.

Somewhere along the way, he developed the strangest ability to make her feel really bad and simultaneously irritated at herself for feeling bad. He stares into the water but she stares across it, at the island, and they're both silent.

She doesn't want a fucking cupcake, she wants a fucking cigarette.

But she'd rather dive off this ferry than admit it. How he'd jump on her for it and rub her nose in it and tease her and lord it over her, that she wants a cigarette. He's probably been waiting for hours to do just that because she knows he saw her sucking one down this morning.

Beside her, he pushes himself up off the railing and silently takes his cigarette pack and his lighter out of yet another jacket pocket. Bastard is going to smoke right in front of her. Asshole.

She watches from the corner of her eye, pretending not to watch, as he shakes out a cigarette. And then a second. He puts the pack away and nestles both cigarettes between his lips. He flicks his thumb against his lighter and the flame catches, his large hand cupping it against the wind as he lights both cigarettes together. Now she's watching, staring up at him, watching his hands and his mouth, not just a little intrigued. His lips pull and the sparks glow, puffed to life. He plucks one cigarette from his lips, offering it to her.

What a bastard.

She thinks about refusing it or flicking it into the sound.

Her fingers brush against his as she takes it. She puts it in her mouth and takes a deep drag. The paper on the filter feels slightly damp from his lips.

She waits for him to say something stupid and infantile and condescending. He doesn't say anything, just staring down at her with dark eyes until she has to look away. The wind is cold and sharp; that's what's making her cheeks burn, is all.

They smoke together, leaning against the iron railing. The wind snatches away the smoke as soon as it leaves their mouths. "Thanks, Holder," she finally relents, quietly, the wind snatching away her words as well.

He's standing so close, she feels rather than sees when he shrugs. "We're gonna get the warrant, Linden," he says seriously. "We'll get in there, find that keycard. Don't worry."

He doesn't know that and it's a pretty hollow reassurance, given their track record of things going well on this case. And why _shouldn't_ she worry, huh, really, heading back into that den of wolves and thieves? But he's being _nice_ and...other stuff, so she swallows down her snappy remarks and simply nods a little.

He's developed another strange ability over these past few weeks: the ability to read her like a book. And that's so goddamn annoying.


	15. PIECES OF A DREAM

2x12 - Donnie or Marie

* * *

><p>She hasn't slept. She was definitely tired when she finally climbed out of Holder's car, their plans for the morning firmly in place. And the hot shower she took felt good, relaxing. But she's just been laying here in this motel bed in the dark, awake. Her brain won't shut off. The darkness and the polyester blankets feel heavy and suffocating. The room feels too big. She feels alone. So very alone. For once, in the past three weeks at least, she isn't scared someone is after her, coming to harm her, but she still doesn't like the emptiness, the lack of someone with her. She still misses Jack like she would miss her breast if it were cut off. A part of her body is missing. She swings wildly between making detailed step-by-step plans of how she'll get him back and fighting back more waves of bone-deep pain and threatening, salty tears.<p>

She wishes...she wishes Holder had tried to convince her to stay at his place tonight.

The clock has jumped ahead a fair bit when she looks at it again. She must've finally dozed off some. She has the vague, warm feeling of having just had dinner in a nice restaurant with a man in an expensive, well-cut suit. The man looked like Rick but wasn't Rick, dream-logic telling her it was Holder instead. Holder with better hair.

She gets up, her dream fading, the cold room replacing those warm feelings. It's not yet dawn outside her window, but by the time she changes into running clothes and shoes, the sky is light enough to qualify. She hasn't been running for a while. It's unpleasant and hard-going, more so than usual. A different kind of pain, the sting of cold air bringing different kinds of tears to her eyes. She runs faster.

When she has to slow and then stop to catch her breath, she's in the canyons of downtown, the skyscrapers reaching high above. Near empty, the workday not yet started for most, but there's a Starbucks open across the street, glowing yellow in the morning's purple gloom, earlybirds in suits and ties inside.

She leans against a Seattle Times box, hanging onto it as she stretches her abused muscles. Glancing at the news headlines, they remind her it's election day but tell her nothing new and say nothing of what's _really_ going on in this city. The truth is not in black and white.

She straightens up, feeling loose but realizing just how far she ran and just how far she's gonna have to run back to the motel. She looks forlornly across the street. She should've brought some cash or her debit card so she could get a coffee and sit.

Something jumps in her chest when she sees Holder coming out of the Starbucks with two white cups in his hand. How'd he know she was here, where'd he come from? God, he's her savior, always with coffee and a smoke when she needs it. How does he do that?

But then she realizes she's an idiot because there's no way Holder would be down here at this hour and also because that's not Holder. It's some tall skinny white dude in a black hoodie with an unlit cigarette hanging out of his mouth. Her confusion is understandable, she reckons. But it's not him.

She watches Not-Holder approach two people she hadn't noticed yet – a woman with a long, dyed-black ponytail and a very young little boy, the two of them sitting on a bench, ostensibly waiting for Not-Holder. From here, the woman looks pretty in a lean, hard way, tired and serious and underfed. The way the woman fusses with the little boy's knit hat, tugging on it, Linden knows she must be his mother. The boy is pre-school or kindergarten age, sweet-faced with big eyes, sitting quietly beside her, swinging his feet. He breaks Linden's heart a little. Why are they up so early and down here, of all places?

Not-Holder hands one cup and a cigarette to the woman and she takes off the lid, burying herself in the hot drink. Not-Holder lights her cigarette and his, but then squats down in front of the little boy, eye to eye with him, and gives him a cookie or small pastry. Linden sees Not-Holder's face light up bright as he smiles and talks to the boy, tenderness and doting affection plainly evident when the man touches the boy's cheek and wipes cookie crumbs away with his thumb.

Linden feels a sharp tug deep inside her. She had pretty much planned to have a kid with Rick after they got married. She wanted to have another baby. But she knows Rick is gone from her life for good.

She sees Not-Holder hold his hand up flat, expectant, and the little boy slaps it, a high five, and Not-Holder laughs, delighted, the sound carrying through the glass and concrete canyon.

The tug, the tick, they ache inside. She _still_ wants to have another baby. She knows rationally, practically, it's _the_ most disastrous idea ever, at present. But her body wants what it wants, however irrationally and impractically, however impossible it seems. She's still young enough. Her body wants to find a way.

Linden watches Not-Holder and his family leave the bench and head up the street together, mom and dad holding the little boy's hands. This young, improbable little family on their own, on the empty streets at dawn – them against the whole world, it seems to Linden, watching them.

She turns away and starts to run again. She thinks of them the whole way back to her motel. Wherever they were headed, Linden hopes they make it.


	16. DINNER AND DANCING

2x12 Donnie or Marie

* * *

><p>He runs his finger down the array of neatly displayed candy bars. Snickers, Mars, plain and peanut M&amp;Ms, Reese's (his fave), Three Musketeers (his least fave), Nutter Butter. He briefly wonders which kind Michael Ames had when he took this ferry that fateful night almost a month ago. A tasty Nutter Butter after watching a teenage girl get assaulted and dragged away to be killed probably hit the spot real good. Then he thinks about how Linden bitched him out for feeding her too much sugar.<p>

"Gimme uh...two large coffees, a soft pretzel, and a bag of mixed nuts," he tells the guy behind the counter of the little commissary they have on board here. The guy turns away to fill the order. Holder taps his fingers along with the radio playing on the counter and impatiently shifts his weight from foot to foot.

He'll be very, very glad to never get on this goddamn slow-ass fucking ferry ever again, if possible. Hopefully this trip to squeeze these "missing" security tapes outta old Bobby will be the _last_ trip. He can think of better ways to waste his time.

He tosses the bag of nuts onto the table in front of Linden and she looks up sharply, startled. "Your nuts," he tells her, grinning.

"You're so punny," she says flatly, accepting the cup of coffee from him.

He sits across from her at the metal picnic table and takes a huge bite off the warm pretzel. Kinda stale, needs more butter, but he's had worse. She suddenly rips off a big chunk before he can yank it away from her reach and she stuffs it in her mouth.

"So, Sensei," she starts, mouth full, chewing. "What's my first lesson in the bloodsport of life, huh?" She swallows thickly. "Asian cookery? The precepts of Theravada Buddhism? Macramé?"

How about "respecting your sensei" to start with? Instead he answers, thinking of a conversation they had a few days ago, "Lesson one, Little Bear? Living a little in this life of ours."

"And what's your idea of living a little, Holder? Besides having a smoke and making sushi and breakfast burritos. What have you been doing to 'live a little' in the middle of all this?"

He ignores the brittle edge in her tone because she sorta has a point. Not much, would be the answer, honestly. Besides beating up his ex-dealer and sorta unintentionally tacitly turning Claire from N.A. into a crack whore. Meth whore, rather. Though, to be honest, he highly doubts that's the first time she's fucked for drugs.

"What about that date you had a couple weeks ago?" she goes on conversationally. She pops an almond into her mouth. "Were you ever able to reschedule that?"

What's she talking about? What date? "Huh?"

"That day Jack went missing. You said you had a date. You had flowers."

Oh _fuck_. That. God. He rubs the back of his neck and hunches over his cup of coffee. "That... That was a lie," he admits, feeling super shitty, even it was just a little harmless lie. "I didn't have no date. I haven't had one in awhile," he adds, mumbling into his cup. She must think he's a total loser. And he expects her to jump all over him for lying to her, demand an explanation of some sort. Trust, y'know? It comes at a premium around here.

But when she asks, "So you're still celibate?" he damn near chokes on his coffee in surprise. Definitely not what he expected and hell no he's not going to answer that. He just pretends he didn't hear her and keeps his eyes on his coffee.

"That day, I was supposed to go to a thing at my nephew's school. No date," he explains. "The present was for him, for Davy."

"Oh." Guilt stamped all over her face. Not busting his balls _now_, is she? But he didn't tell her this to make her feel bad, or to be a martyr. That day Jack went missing was what it was – even if it turned out to be a big false alarm in the end.

He reaches across the table and stretches out one long finger, tapping it against her hand gently. He makes sure she's looking at him when he tells her, "There was no way I was gonna leave you alone that day, Linden."

She seems to accept he means that, is serious, and takes it how she will. That day, helping her, supporting her, he felt _good_ about himself and like he was doing something good for someone else for the first time in a long time. That day, she became his partner for real. And that _mattered_. He doesn't regret a moment of it.

"I met your sister at the hospital last week," she says. His finger is still touching her hand. "I didn't get to meet Davy, though."

"Davy's my boy, yo! You'd love him, he's awesome, Linden," he tells her.

A big smile stretches his tired face, thinking of his favorite little man. God, he misses that kid. He promised to be there twenty-four-seven for the kid but hasn't yet been able to deliver on that particular promise. But he will. When this case is done, he's gonna convince his sister to let him take Little Man to the zoo or something, spend some time with him, go to his school stuff and whatnot.

"I was teaching him kung fu, right? Bruce Lee is his favorite. And I taught him how to do the Robot and the Worm and stuff, too. I'll take you to meet him and have him show you that shit. It's so damn cute."

He's still grinning away and she's staring at him with this funny look on her face that he can't quite read. Something sort of intense but soft, staring right into him. For a _while_. It's making him squirm. Maybe she just thinks he's gone completely soft, gushing about his little nephew.

"You can do the Worm?" she finally asks, raising an eyebrow.

"I can totally do the Worm." Just not with a busted rib.

"I can, too," she confesses.

"Bull. Shit."

"It's true," she confirms.

He eyeballs her, stuffing the last of the pretzel into his mouth and licking the salt off his fingers. Now he has an idea. Now he knows how to answer her original question. "Let's dance."

She doesn't say anything as he stands up from the picnic table and starts to do the robot, moving with the music playing on the radio across the commissary. She's staring. So are the three or four other passengers in the room. So is the guy behind the counter. Who gives a fuck? He keeps roboting.

"Holder—"

"Live a little, Linden. Show me your Worm!"

He keeps dancing, holding back because of his ribs. He dangles his forearm and pinwheels it around three-sixty. She's sitting there gawking, laughing at him. Yeah, like _he's_ the nutty one. Maybe he is. She shakes her head, tells him, "I'm not doing the worm, Holder."

"Oh come on!"

"No. The floor is sticky and gross and there's old gum on it."

True, but still. Ah, but now she's getting up! Good girl. She's coming around the table, where there's more room, and saying, "But I can pop-n-lock like a motherfucker so back up, bitch."

He's pretty sure he'll look back on this as the moment he fell in love with her.


	17. PRIMORDIAL

2x13 - WHAT I KNOW

* * *

><p>They're done.<p>

It's over.

She feels like she's in shock, her system overloaded and overwhelmed. If she were a computer, she'd be that fucking blank blue screen.

For the past few weeks, she'd occasionally have a chance to think, "So what happens after this case is over?" Sometimes it seemed like it'd never end. But now that it has...

Trying to think of "what now" is impossible. She can't think. She's too tired and wracked. Stimulation, emotion, mental, physical overload. All she can manage is to get through the next minute and the next and the next, move step by step by step to what's absolutely necessary. That's how climbers climb mountains.

Her next step and her next and her next take her into their office. The lights are too bright. She turns them off. The noise in the hall is too loud. She shuts it out. Her legs are giving out. She sits down. She needs everything to just _be quiet _right now, inside and out. She even turns her phone off. She sits still. She is still. She sits alone in the dark.

Alone in the dark.

She's alone in the dark.

The moment she realizes what she's doing, sudden fear grips her, a panic. Heart racing, stomach cold iron, eyes blind. A primordial response, instinctive to all human beings, the fear of the dark. The fear of a five year old.

She sits here and feels it. She could thwart it by turning on the lights. She sits still instead. She lets it come over her. She lets it be with her. She doesn't fight it. She _wants_ it. She wants to feel it. She wants to _know_. What Rosie Larsen felt. She wants to feel something of what Rosie felt, in the dark, in that trunk, as the water rushed in, as the fear became everything. She slips inside the fear. Slips under the water. Sinking to the bottom. Lets herself go deep.

Reality slipping away. She feels it. Nothing but dark and fear.

A little voice reminds her. "This is how you ended up staring at walls for weeks, before." Why does it sound like Holder's voice?

She stills her chest, stops her breathing. Life breath slipping away.

The fear so deep it slips away. Acceptance. You are going to die. Alone. In the dark.

The door opens like a smash of thunder. Overhead fluorescents blink on like lightning. She zooms up from the bottom of the darkness, blind for a moment, gasping for breath, coming back to time and place and his face. His face. A mirror of her own, tired and drawn and blank, a blank blue screen face.

And then the lights go out again. The door shuts again. Dark again.

He sits down in front of her, in the chair beside their desks, his back to her. She can smell him, cigarettes and wet cotton and that hippie orange patchouli soap he has in his bathroom. She can hear him, his slow breathing. She can feel him, his presence in front of her like a shield. She can hear his thoughts and they match hers and they're scant – _be quiet be still._

She sits in the darkness.

But she's not alone.


	18. DAY ONE

**A/N: Thanks for all the comments! I really appreciate them and I'm glad to know there are other Linden/Holder fans out there. That was QUITE a season finale! But, frankly, not enough of them in it. Fingers crossed for a third season so we get more of these two amazing characters.**

* * *

><p>2x13 - WHAT I KNOW<p>

* * *

><p>He leans against the concrete wall of the transport bay. It's almost five a.m. and the November air feels damn good, cold and fresh. He sucks it in deep. The sky is clear today. It's going to be sunny later. A beautiful day.<p>

The prisoner van left three minutes ago, taking Terri Marek to County. He watched her get loaded in. She looked at him one last time with vacant eyes and he couldn't muster up the energy to hate her or pity her or scorn her or even fucking wonder how she could do such a thing. She don't matter anymore. She'll be a court date on his calendar in a few months and then he'll never think of her again.

He fell asleep in their office, a sore-neck snooze, while Linden watched Rosie Larsen's home movie. He had no interest in seeing it. That's Sarah's deal, not his. She's the one who breaks bread with the dead. Someone woke him up, told him Marek was being transported, and he looked around for Sarah, expecting to find her still watching the film, OCD-style. He found the projector, still hot, but didn't find her.

Now Linden finds him and she's brought the coffee this time. He's kinda beyond needing a pick-me-up but drinks it anyway, out of habit. "Why again did we decide to stop smoking?" he asks.

"_You're_ the one who decided we should."

"Oh yeah I forgot."

"How're your ribs?"

"Fine."

And before he knows it, her little hand is inside his jacket and trying to pull up his sweatshirt. He grabs her hand, stilling it. "Ah ah ah! At least buy me dinner first," he teases her. He doesn't want her seeing the long expanse of blue-brown-purple-green-yellow flesh that is his right side, doesn't want her seeing that ugly fucking mess. He re-aggravated the injury a couple times the past few days, falling when he tripped Janek Kovarsky's guy, and then trying to subdue the gorilla-like Stan Larsen. But he doesn't want her worrying about it, about him. He gives her hand a squeeze. "It's fine, Dr. Mom. I swear. Can we go home now?"

She drops her hand from his side and shakes her head. "One last thing to do."

"All I want is to take a hot shower and sleep for like a _week_, yo," he says, sagging against the wall.

She nods slowly but she's got this thousand-yard stare. "I want my child," she finally says and that's just the knockout to the emotional pummeling he's taken. Quietly his heart breaks for her. "I need to go to Chicago."

He expected that. "Okay."

She suddenly looks up at him, back from that distant place, and asks, "Do you want to go to Chicago with me?"

He was not expecting that. He stares down at her, trying to read her, not sure if she means that the way it sounds. Does she mean that? He imagines he has this look of dumb shock on his face.

"Jack likes you better than he likes me at the moment," she says, chuckling some. Is she covering, joking around, back-pedaling? Or does she really mean that, too? He's so confused. She stares at the cement wall. "I'm worried he won't wanna come back with me," she explains finally, honestly. "That he wants to stay in Chicago."

"No, Linden," he says seriously, trying to assure her. "No. He wants to be with you. You're his moms, y'know?" She doesn't seem convinced. "I mean, come on - they put tomatoes and pickle spears on the hotdogs out there. What's that about, huh? That's _nasty_."

She chuckles again and he does too, but it's brief and the silence feels awkward because he's still not sure if she meant it and maybe neither is she. She coughs. "Will you be able to give me a ride to the airport tomorrow or whenever? Or will you be sleeping?" she asks.

Ah.

She didn't mean it.

He was letting his wild imagination run off down the road, buck naked and screaming. He's an idiot. He hopes he doesn't look as disappointed as he feels. "Of course. Anytime. I'm your ride, Linden, you know that."

"I do know."

She leans closer, leaning into him, slipping in under his arm and leaning into his good side, pressing her face into his sweatshirt. She's surprised him yet again. He sets his coffee on top of the cement wall and lets both arms come around her, hugging her to him. She's so small in his arms. She's nearly engulfed by his open jacket. "What's this for?" he risks asking.

"For everything. 'Cuz you're my BFF, Holder."

They hold onto each other, hold each other up, and that's a familiar feeling, but not like _this_, never like this before. The feel of her hair under his cheek isn't familiar. The feel of her fist clutching his sweatshirt isn't familiar. He lets his eyes close. He lets the moment linger. He's so tired. Her hair smells like cigarette smoke and shampoo. He wants to sleep for a week with his face buried in her hair. "Can we sleep now, Linden?"

She steps away from him, but he doesn't let her go far, keeping his arm around her shoulders, steadying himself. "One last thing," she says, taking something out of her coat pocket. It's a DVD in a paper sleeve. "Rosie's film."

So that's where she's been. Up in the lab, having the film transferred to digital. He knows where they'll be going now, what they'll do when they get there. He nods and she smiles up at him, her skin glowing white like marble in the pre-dawn. He knows it's her goodness glowing from within. It lights her way in this world. It lights his way.

He keeps his arm around her as they head for his car. It's five a.m. and they're alone out here, two angels of the morning with a special delivery to make.

* * *

><p><strong>The end.<strong>


End file.
